Startup Message Bus Raises $11 Million in Funding Led by North Bridge Venture Partners

Message Bus was started by experts of the cloud computing movement; they are approaching the problem of messaging by solving it in the cloud where they can leverage their experiences and knowledge of building systems that scale to meet enterprise needs.

Corte Madera, CA – October 15, 2012 - Message Bus, the first to provide a cloud-native application service enabling and powering messaging across email and mobile channels, today announced that it has closed $11 million in growth funding. The round was led by North Bridge Venture Partners and included True Ventures, Ignition Partners, James Lindenbaum, Tim Young and Jesse Robbins. Message Bus plans to use the funding to accelerate its hiring and product roadmap.

Message Bus, founded in 2010, was born out of a long time frustration of configuring and administering email and other messaging servers; as a result the founders created the first cloud-native application service to enable and power messaging across established and emerging channels. The technology greatly reduces CAPEX expenditures associated with building, running and maintaining enterprise messaging applications while increasing customer engagement through improved message deliverability.

Paul Santinelli, Partner at North Bridge Venture Partners and Message Bus Board Member, said: “Companies are realizing the benefits and efficiencies of highly elastic, redundant cloud-based systems. Message Bus was started by experts of the cloud computing movement; they are approaching the problem of messaging by solving it in the cloud where they can leverage their experiences and knowledge of building systems that scale to meet enterprise needs.”

Jon Callaghan, Founding Partner at True Ventures, said: “Internet messaging is becoming more complex through channel proliferation. What was once a complex problem has been confounded now that customers interact with companies through email, mobile and social messaging. Each channel requires a unique message type which forces companies to spin up more and more costly messaging servers. Message Bus is poised to solve the messaging challenge across channels by creating a single platform to enable messaging in the cloud.”

Frank Artale, Partner at Ignition Partners, said: ”Cloud-native is the future. Enterprises are taking the step of deploying critical systems in the cloud. Messaging is critical to every company’s ability to do business by enabling them to engage with a global customer base. Every consumer action on a company’s website or application translates into an email, a text or a mobile message – that’s a huge volume of messages that needs to be sent and able to grow over time. Only a cloud based system allows for this kind of rapid growth and scalability.”

Jeremy LaTrasse, CEO and Co-Founder of Message Bus, said: “We couldn’t have assembled a better team of luminary advisors and investors in the cloud computing space along with our existing team. Message Bus is poised to become the leader in messaging with the industry’s first truly cloud-native application service for email, mobile and social messaging.”

Message Bus provides a cloud-native application service for enabling and powering messaging across email and mobile channels, helping to ensure deliverability of critical communications, transactional messages, and marketing messages. The company removes the burden and cost of deploying multiple messaging servers with a service available via SMTP or through a programmatic API. Market leading companies rely on Message Bus to manage the trust relationship between senders and recipients, increasing their message deliverability rates and revenues. Key benefits include lower cost to market, compliance to industry regulations, and protecting brand reputation. More information is available on the company’s website: http://www.messagebus.com.

North Bridge Venture Partners is an active, bi-coastal, early-stage venture capital firm based in Boston, Massachusetts and San Mateo, California. Established in 1994, North Bridge provides seed-to-growth financing and company-building expertise. Together with North Bridge Growth Equity, North Bridge manages over $3 billion. Working in concert with entrepreneurs, North Bridge adds value by providing strategic guidance, sharing operating experience, industry specific knowledge, team-building skills and an in-depth understanding of both private and public financings. For more information about North Bridge, go to: http://www.nbvp.com.

About True Ventures

Founded in 2006, True Ventures is a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups. With three funds and approximately $600 million in capital under management, True provides seed and Series A funding to the most talented entrepreneurs in today’s fastest growing markets. True encourages each founder’s vision and helps entrepreneurs achieve higher levels of success and impact. With more than 100 companies funded and multiple companies acquired, the True portfolio has created over 1,900 jobs. To learn more about True Ventures, visit: http://www.trueventures.com.

About Ignition Partners

Ignition Partners, headquartered in Bellevue, Washington, is a premier venture capital firm dedicated to creating powerful partnerships that bring together software, wireless, communications and the Internet. Founded by former Microsoft and McCaw Cellular Communication senior executives, Ignition’s partners and principals all have operational leadership experience in the software, Internet, communications and wireless industries. Qualcomm, Softbank Venture Capital and Madrona Venture Group are prominent investors and strategic partners. For more information, please visit: http://www.ignitionpartners.com.